Download or read book A Year with Mordecai Kaplan written by Steven Carr Reuben and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019-04-01 with total page 295 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: You are invited to spend a year with the inspirational words, ideas, and counsel of the great twentieth-century thinker Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, through his meditations on the fifty-four weekly Torah portions and eleven Jewish holidays. A pioneer of ideas and action—teaching that “Judaism is a civilization” encompassing Jewish culture, art, and peoplehood; demonstrating how synagogues can be full centers for Jewish living (building one of the first “shuls with a pool”); and creating the first-ever bat mitzvah ceremony (for his daughter Judith)—Kaplan transformed the landscape of American Jewry. Yet much of Kaplan’s rich treasury of ethical and spiritual thought is largely unknown. Rabbi Steven Carr Reuben, who studied closely with Kaplan, offers unique insight into Kaplan’s teachings about ethical relationships and spiritual fulfillment, including how to embrace godliness in everyday experience, our mandate to become agents of justice in the world, and the human ability to evolve personally and collectively. Quoting from the week’s Torah portion, Reuben presents Torah commentary, a related quotation from Kaplan, a reflective commentary integrating Kaplan’s understanding of the Torah text, and an intimate story about his family or community’s struggles and triumphs—guiding twenty-first-century spiritual seekers of all backgrounds on how to live reflectively and purposefully every day.
Download or read book Judaism as a Civilization written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by Legare Street Press. This book was released on 2023-07-22 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1934, Mordecai Kaplan's groundbreaking study of Judaism as a civilization remains a landmark work of Jewish thought. Kaplan argues that Judaism is not just a religion, but a comprehensive civilization that encompasses everything from language and literature to art and social organization. He lays out a program for the reconstruction of American-Jewish life that is still relevant today, and his ideas have had a profound influence on Jewish thought and practice in the United States. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Download or read book The Radical American Judaism of Mordecai M Kaplan written by Mel Scult and published by Modern Jewish Experience. This book was released on 2013 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mordecai M. Kaplan, founder of the Jewish Reconstructionist movement, is the only rabbi to have been excommunicated by the Orthodox rabbinical establishment in America. Kaplan was indeed a heretic, rejecting such fundamental Jewish beliefs as the concept of the chosen people and a supernatural God. Although he valued the Jewish community and was a committed Zionist, his primary concern was the spiritual fulfillment of the individual. Drawing on Kaplan's 27-volume diary, Mel Scult describes the development of Kaplan's radical theology in dialogue with the thinkers and writers who mattered to him most, from Spinoza to Emerson and from Ahad Ha-Am and Matthew Arnold to Felix Adler, John Dewey, and Abraham Joshua Heschel. This gracefully argued book, with its sensitive insights into the beliefs of a revolutionary Jewish thinker, makes a powerful contribution to modern Judaism and to contemporary American religious thought.
Download or read book Dynamic Judaism written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 1991 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mordecai M. Kaplan began his life's journey with the confines of a small Lithuanian town on the outskirts of Vilna. He was born on a Friday evening in June of 1881. Kaplan's submergence in a total Jewish atmosphere is illustrated by the fact that he knew his day of birth only by the Jewish calendar until he went to the New York Public Library as a young man to look up the corresponding date. Kaplan's family was a traditional one in every aspect, and his father, Israel Kaplan, was a learned man.
Download or read book A Modern Heretic and a Traditional Community written by Jeffrey S. Gurock and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 1997-02-03 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of the Reconstructionist movement, was the most influential and controversial radical Jewish thinker in the twentieth century. This book examines the intellectual influences that moved Kaplan from Orthodoxy and analyzes the combination of personal, strategic, and career reasons that kept Kaplan close to Orthodox Jews, posing a question crucial to the understanding of any religion: Can an established religious group learn from a heretic who has rejected its most fundamental beliefs?
Download or read book The American Judaism of Mordecai M Kaplan written by Emanuel Goldsmith and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 1992-10 with total page 479 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The life, thought, work, and contemporaries of the renowned Judaicist (1881-1983) are explored in 23 contributed essays by authors who approach Kaplan from a broad range of perspectives. Includes a complete bibliography of Kaplan's writings, beginning with his first publication in 1907 and ending with his posthumous works. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Download or read book Judaism Faces the Twentieth Century written by Mel Scult and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 444 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kaplan, who died in 1983 at the age of 102, arrived in America as a boy, and, as he grew, sought to find ways of making Judaism compatible with the American experience and the modern temper. He founded the Jewish Center and the Society for the Advancement of Judaism, establishing the prototypes for the modern expanded synagogue. This biography reappraises the significance of his contributions and offers an intimate look at the man and his thinking. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Download or read book Dynamic Judaism written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by Schocken. This book was released on 1985 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Questions Jews Ask written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by . This book was released on 1956 with total page 556 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question and answer method employed to clarify the fundamental issues and teachings of Judaism vis-à-vis modern thought contributes to the uniqueness of this volume. The questions were addressed to Dr. Kaplan at forums throughout the country and in letters addressed to him personally. They reflect the difficulties and the doubts which confront American Jews who strive to understand Judaism and seek to reconcile it with the modern outlook on life. The answers are clear-cut, and formulated so they are intelligible for present-day Jewish living. In sum, the book is a guide for American Jews who are perplexed and who are in search of a meaningful Jewish life. Every Jew, interested in Jewish life and thought, will find this book informative and inspiring, and a source of self-education in Judaism. Every Jew, or non-Jew, interested in the encounter of civilizations and their effect on each other will, through this book, gain an insight into the moral and spiritual forces that impel the Jewish people to maintain its inviduality and to contribute its share to the life of mankind.
Download or read book Communings of the Spirit written by Mordecai M. Kaplan and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 2002-05 with total page 568 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881-1983), founder of Reconstructionism, is the preeminent American Jewish thinker and rabbi of our times. His life embodies the American Jewish experience of the first half of the twentieth century. With passionate intensity and uncommon candor, Kaplan compulsively recorded his experience in his journal (some 10,000 pages). This first volume of Communings of the Spirit covers Kaplan's early years as a rabbi, teacher of rabbis, and community leader. Kaplan, who trained rabbis for half a century, gives us an inside picture of life at the Jewish Theological Seminary, the center of Conservative Judaism in America. He records his masterful weekly sermons, which were attended regularly by his students. With unflinching candor, he reveals his successes and failures, uncertainties and self-doubts. Undeterred by attacks on his radical beliefs, he never wavered in the pursuit of a more dynamic Judaism.
Download or read book The Meaning of God in Modern Jewish Religion written by Mordecai M. Kaplan and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 1995-01-01 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, Kaplan enlarges on his notion of functional reinterpretation and then actually applies it to the entire ritual cycle of the Jewish year-a rarity in modern Jewish thought. This work continues to function as a central text for the Reconstructionist movement, whose influence continues to grow in American Jewry.
Download or read book The Future of the American Jew written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by . This book was released on 1948 with total page 602 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Year with Mordecai Kaplan written by Steven Carr Reuben and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Quoting from the week's Torah portion, Rabbi Steven Reuben, who studied closely with Kaplan, presents Torah commentary, a related Kaplan quotation, a reflective commentary integrating Kaplan's understanding of the Torah text, and an intimate story about his family or his community's struggles and triumphs--guiding twenty-first century spiritual seekers of all backgrounds on how to live reflectively and purposefully every day"--
Download or read book A Year with the Sages written by Reuven Hammer and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019-01-01 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Year with the Sages uniquely relates the Sages' understanding of each Torah portion to everyday life. The importance of these teachings cannot be overstated. The Sages, who lived during the period from the fifth century BCE to the fifth century CE, considered themselves to have inherited the oral teachings God transmitted to Moses, along with the mandate to interpret them to each subsequent generation. Just as the Torah and the entire Hebrew Bible are the foundations of Judaism, the Sages' teachings form the structures of Jewish belief and practice built on that foundation. Many of these teachings revolve around core concepts such as God's justice, God's love, Torah, Israel, humility, honesty, loving-kindness, reverence, prayer, and repentance. You are invited to spend a year with the inspiring ideas of the Sages through their reflections on the fifty-four weekly Torah portions and the eleven Jewish holidays. Quoting from the week's Torah portion, Rabbi Reuven Hammer presents a Torah commentary, selections from the Sages that chronicle their process of interpreting the text, a commentary that elucidates these concepts and their consequences, and a personal reflection that illumines the Sages' enduring wisdom for our era.
Download or read book Judaism Without Supernaturalism written by Mordecai Menahem Kaplan and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Chosen People in America written by Arnold M. Eisen and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 1983-11-22 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of how American Jewish thinkers grapple with the notion of being the isolated “Chosen People” in a nation that is a melting pot. What does it mean to be a Jew in America? What opportunities and what threats does the great melting pot represent for a group that has traditionally defined itself as “a people that must dwell alone?” Although for centuries the notion of “The Chosen People” sustained Jewish identity, America, by offering Jewish immigrants an unprecedented degree of participation in the larger society, threatened to erode their Jewish identity and sense of separateness. Arnold M. Eisen charts the attempts of American Jewish thinkers to adapt the notion of chosenness to an American context. Through an examination of sermons, essays, debates, prayer-book revisions, and theological literature, Eisen traces the ways in which American rabbis and theologians—Reconstructionist, Conservative, and Orthodox thinkers—effected a compromise between exclusivity and participation that allowed Jews to adapt to American life while simultaneously enhancing Jewish tradition and identity. “This is a book of extraordinary quality and importance. In tracing the encounter of Jews (the chosen people) and America (the chosen nation) . . . Eisen has given the American Jewish community a new understanding of itself.” —American Jewish Archives “One of the most significant books on American Jewish thought written in recent years.” —Choice
Download or read book The Radical American Judaism of Mordecai M Kaplan written by Mel Scult and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2013-11-29 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An important and powerful work that speaks to Mordecai M. Kaplan’s position as perhaps the most significant Jewish thinker of the twentieth century.” (Deborah Dash Moore coeditor of Gender and Jewish History) Mordecai M. Kaplan, founder of the Jewish Reconstructionist movement, is the only rabbi to have been excommunicated by the Orthodox rabbinical establishment in America. Kaplan was indeed a radical, rejecting such fundamental Jewish beliefs as the concept of the chosen people and a supernatural God. Although he valued the Jewish community and was a committed Zionist, his primary concern was the spiritual fulfillment of the individual. Drawing on Kaplan’s 27-volume diary, Mel Scult describes the development of Kaplan’s radical theology in dialogue with the thinkers and writers who mattered to him most, from Spinoza to Emerson and from Ahad Ha-Am and Matthew Arnold to Felix Adler, John Dewey, and Abraham Joshua Heschel. This gracefully argued book, with its sensitive insights into the beliefs of a revolutionary Jewish thinker, makes a powerful contribution to modern Judaism and to contemporary American religious thought. “An interesting, stimulating, and well-done analysis of Kaplan’s life and thought. All students of contemporary Jewish life will benefit from reading this excellent study.” —Jewish Media Review “The book is highly readable―at times almost colloquial in its language and style―and is recommended for anybody with a familiarity with Kaplan but who wants to understand his thought within a broader context.” —AJL Reviews
